Editorial
 Click here to listen to an interview with the authors on the ENN podcast channel |
It has been a very busy time for the wider nutrition community. There is a sense of urgency to do more to tackle current levels of malnutrition and this is reflected in a number of the articles and global themes covered in this 9th issue of Nutrition Exchange. The FAO State of Food Security and Nutrition report (page 5) for example, gives a worrying picture of the rise in hunger, for the first time since 2001. This is mainly (but not restricted to) fragile and conflict-affected settings, which account for a considerable proportion of stunting and wasting globally, as echoed in the 2017 Global Nutrition Report (page 4).
There are three articles from countries facing both development and emergency-related challenges. The article on war-torn Yemen (page 10) describes harnessing community leadership to increase access to nutrition services for mothers and children. Community-based interventions feature in an article from Niger (page 12) that describes Husband Schools, which focus on educating men to improve maternal and child health through nutrition, family planning and agriculture initiatives. The article on Nepal (page 27) looks at how female community health volunteers swap their sterile flipcharts for colourful, tactile trays of real food for nutrition counselling purposes to positive effect. Of course, scaling-up ‘what works’ is the next challenge – and both articles touch on plans to take relatively small-scale interventions to the next level.
‘Multi-sector’ and ‘nutrition-sensitive programming’ are terms that are constantly on everyone’s lips. But what is the reality of sectors working together at the sub-national level? ENN’s Knowledge Management specialists in Asia and Africa describe early findings from studies in Kenya, Nepal and Senegal (page 23); contexts may vary but there are already common lessons to share. Other stories in this issue that touch on the challenges of multi-sector coordination come from two West African countries. In Mauritania (page 16), little change in stunting prevalence over the last decade has prompted new ways of addressing malnutrition, and the development of a multi-sector nutrition plan with a strong behaviour change component through community structures. In Chad (page 14), innovation has come in the form of a new layer of co-ordination: the appointment of regional nutrition co-ordinators to link sectors and strengthen sectoral cooperation.
The SUN Movement embraces both the concept of scale-up and multi-sector programming and a number of tools and resources are available to support countries to achieve this. An article on technical assistance for SUN Member countries describes the experiences of Tajikistan and the Philippines (page 20) in accessing this support to develop a Common Results Framework and a plan of action for nutrition, respectively. The Joint Assessment process is another SUN tool that enables SUN networks to take stock of their common goals and objectives. An article considers observations of the process in two countries, Burkina Faso and Kenya (page 18). Another tool from the UN ‘family’ is the Compendium of Actions for Nutrition: the CAN, as it is known, has been used to great effect in Haiti and Myanmar (page 25) to drive home the multi-sectoral concept and the understanding that nutrition is every sector’s responsibility.
Finally, we’ve been really busy at ENN, too: read ‘What’s New at ENN?’ (page 8) to find out about a new online resource, NutritionGroups, the latest updated version of Operational Guidance on infant and young child feeding in emergencies, and the release of a new discussion paper on addressing stunting in protracted crisis contexts, among other initiatives. ENN had a prominent role at the recent SUN Movement Global Gathering and we share some thoughts from one of our team members who attended (on page 29).
We would also like to thank all the NEX readers who took part in the ENN impact survey for your insights into what we’re doing well (for example, providing opportunities to learn from the experiences of peers), as well as what we could do better (such as broaden the list of recipients with national networks around the government ministries and civil society). We value all feedback, so send us your ideas for sharing your invaluable experiences in tackling malnutrition. As with every issue, a huge thanks to all our contributors and happy reading!
Carmel Dolan, Co-editor, NEX
Judith Hodge, Co-editor, NEX